The invention relates to office workspace. More specifically, the invention relates to a multi-surface projection system with multi-camera input for such an office workspace.
As companies and corporations continue to grow and increase in employment, office space as well as worker efficiency become more important commodities. Accordingly, the design and use of office spaces, such as cubicles or walled offices, become a priority for such companies and corporations.
Current approaches to such designs of office space include the incorporation of projectors and cameras to replace and supplement portions of an office worker""s computer workstation. For example, the computer monitor can be replaced by a projector system such that the computer screen can be projected onto a wall of the office, thereby eliminating the need to have a computer monitor in the office workspace. Accordingly, this increases the amount of workspace for an office worker without increasing or even decreasing the actual size of the office. Moreover, this approach increases the viewing area of the computer screen thereby allowing the office worker to become more efficient, as multiple applications can be viewed at one time.
However, typical approaches to such designs place the projectors off-angle to the project screen. For example, one such approach is to mount the projectors on the ceilings above the projection screens. However, when projectors are off-angle, the projections are often distorted. In particular, this off-angled projection causes what is termed xe2x80x9ckeystoning.xe2x80x9d A projection that is xe2x80x9ckeystonedxe2x80x9d is trapezoidal in nature. In particular, FIGS. 1a-1b illustrate a projection that is xe2x80x9ckeystonedxe2x80x9d due to the projector being off-angle from the projection screen. FIG. 1a includes projector 102 projecting projection 106 onto projection screen 104. Projector 102 is above and thus off-angle from projection screen 104. Accordingly, as illustrated in FIG. 1b, the image produced onto projection screen 104 is shaped like a trapezoid, which causes the image to be distorted and out-of-focus.
Further, current approaches incorporate cameras into the office space to provide for video conferencing capability. With regard to video conferencing capability, a typical approach includes the placement of a camera on the top of the computer monitor from which a user is working, thereby allowing the users to view one another as they are working at their respective computers. Disadvantageously, the cameras employed in such embodiments are inherently wide-angled in order to be able to capture the user""s image due to the closeness of the camera to the user, thereby causing fish-eye distortion typically associated with wide-angle lenses. Moreover, because the user looks at the monitor screen rather than the camera, the camera does not capture an eye-contact view, which is important in video-based interactions.
Another typical approach for the incorporation of cameras into the office space to provide for video conferencing capability is to mount the cameras on the ceiling above the workspace. However, this set-up still does not provide for gaze awareness and eye contact between individuals involved in the videoconference.
Accordingly, the current approaches to the projection/camera-based office workspace lack the proper integration of projectors and cameras into such workspaces to provide video conferencing that minimizes the distortion while providing a better facial perspective and providing gaze awareness among the individuals involved in the video conference. Moreover, current approaches to the projection/camera-based workspace fail to provide undistorted projections onto the projection screens of the workspace as well as other limitations.